INFOTAINMENT/TELEMATICS ANALYSIS

Gone are the days of car stereos chewing your favourite mix-tape, having to pull over to use a public phone box to make a call, or driving with a map draped over the steering wheel… Almost every modern car, van, bus and lorry now contains an infotainment system capable of many activities similar to a mobile phone; capabilities including (but not limited to):

Music system

Satellite navigation

Access to system settings

Connection to Bluetooth devices (headsets, mobile phones etc)

Ability to make and receive phone calls

Ability to send and receive SMS messages

Ability to store contacts from paired devices

Ability to access paired phone’s own satellite navigation application and use it instead of the stock, built-in application

Ability to access and use Android Auto and Apple Car Play

Using specialist hardware and software we are able to download the memory of a vehicle and extract:

A list of all paired devices

SMS

Call logs

Contacts

Saved locations (Home, office etc)

GPS coordinates and journey information

Event data

Gear changes

Brake lights engaged

Door opened / closed

USB device connection

Phone connection

Journeys, showing the actual route taken

And much more…

​Vehicle forensics is a notoriously difficult discipline, made more challenging by car manufacturers who are less than forthcoming with technical data regarding their in car systems. In the US, legislation exists which forces the manufacturers of all cars produced since 2011 to allow access to data contained within car systems by third parties. In the UK, there is no such legislation and, as a result, extracting data from UK models can be far more difficult. That said, we are already capable of extracting data from ~10,000 models of vehicle and that figure is constantly rising...

We are one of the only companies in the UK to possess the specialist equipment, techniques and knowledge to be able to access vehicular data in this manner. Additionally, our commitment to research and development and our hard earned reputation as being one of the leading proponents of mobile device forensics in the UK further sets us apart – we are able to extract and decode data from even more vehicles, including those which are currently unsupported by others by utilising the cutting edge tools and techniques honed in our mobile phone forensics laboratory.

CRASH DATA ANALYSIS

A fact few people are aware of is that most modern vehicles contain a hidden event data recorder which, in some ways, is akin to an aeroplane’s ‘black box’. This device records the seconds leading up to a crash and can reveal such information as:

Were seatbelts connected?

The speed of the car

We’re the brakes applied? If so, when?

What was the angle of the steering wheel?

Was the car hit from behind or the front? Or from behind, then the front? Or from the side? Etc…

Certain driver inputs for about 5 seconds before a crash

Vehicle crash severity signature

Post-crash data such as the activation of an automatic collision notification (ACN) system

We are able to locate and extract the event data recorder from the vehicle and download all available data using our industry leading equipment and skills.

This data can be invaluable for crash investigators and insurance companies to assist in determining exactly what happened and who, if anyone, was at fault, especially in cases where there are no witnesses or witness statements are in conflict.

The above infotainment and EDR data can often give access to data unavailable by any other means. This can be especially useful when combined with mobile phone data extracted from drivers (see mobile phone forensics here). Using all of these valuable data resources, we are able to build a clearer picture than ever before of exactly what happened during a crash.